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Rhode Island Prevailing Wages: What you need to know

A “prevailing wage” is a rate of pay determined by government authorities to be the norm in a particular geographic area for a given class of labor and type of project. Prevailing wage determinations are made using local data and are equivalent to union rates in most areas. Prevailing minimum wages, on the other hand, tend to track statutory minimum wages in a geographic area.

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To give organized labor a fair chance when bidding for government contracts, federal law requires all employers performing federal contracts to pay prevailing wages to their workers. This ensures that nonunion employers cannot gain an unfair bidding advantage by paying wages far below the union rate and passing the savings on to the government in the form of lower bids. Virtually all federal expenditures in the private sector are covered by prevailing wage provisions. The main statutes in this area are the Davis-BaconAct, governing federal construction contracts; the McNamara-O'Hara Service Contract Act, governing contracts to provide services to the federal government; and the Walsh-Healey Act, governing the manufacturing of goods for the government. There is additional information on federal prevailing wage law.

Rhode Island has a state prevailing wage law for public works contracts valued in excess of $1,000. "Public works" means any public work consisting of grading, cleaning, demolishment, improvement, completion, repair, alteration, or construction of any public road or any bridge or portion thereof or any heavy construction or any public works projects of any nature or kind. Subcontractors working on-site on a public works project must comply with the same applicable laws, rules, ...

We’ve compiled a list of the 100 most commonly asked questions we have received on the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) overtime regulations.
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This report, "Top 100 FLSA Q&As", is designed to provide you with an examination of the federal FLSA overtime regulations in Q&A format, including valuable tips for bringing your workplace into compliance in an affordable manner.

At the end of the report, you will find a list of state resources on wage and hour issues.
This report includes practical advice on topics such as:

FLSA Coverage: How FLSA regulations apply to all employers and any specific exemptions from the overtime requirements